Pocketpair communications director and publishing manager John Buckley explains how AI can harm even its most vocal detractors.
Palworld developer Pocketpair launched a dedicated publishing division in January to help studios bring their dream projects to market.
At the time, the Japanese company explained it wanted to use its success to empower other developers. "We want to give you money, and we want to help you make a fun game," it wrote on its website. There is one caveat, however: Pocketpair won't be handing over bundles of cash if your project leverages generative AI.
Speaking to Game Developer at Gamescom Asia about the company's stance on generative AI, Pocketpair communications director and publishing manager John Buckley explained the company simply "doesn't believe" in the polarizing technology. He also wonders, given the fact that Pocketpair is regularly accused of deploying generative AI within Palworld, whether people will actually believe him.
"People are going to say I'm lying, but these are just the hard facts. We don't believe in it. We're very upfront about it. If you're big on AI stuff or your game is Web3 or uses NFTs, there are lots of publishers out there [who'll talk to you], but we're not the right partner for that," he says.
Still, he doesn't expect one publisher's stance to prevent AI-made titles from making headway. In fact, he feels the floodgates are already creaking open. "I think over the next two or three years we're going to get into this weird era—and you can see it slowly happening now on Steam—of really low quality, AI-made games.
"It's something that has plagued other stores but Steam had been good at keeping them out. But it's happening. This wave is coming, and I think we're going to enter this kind of authenticity market where people are going to slowly say 'no, these guys are really trying to make something special' to fight back."
AI content under a microscope
He believes the influx of AI titles will result in consumers and developers putting games under the microscope in a bid to determine which leverage human ingenuity—and which rely on machine-generated outputs. That is going to create its own challenges, especially if you're a studio—like Pocketpair—that is falsely accused of deploying AI.
Buckley explains those claims are difficult to quash because you're ultimately relying on people to trust the word of a company they have already decided is untrustworthy. That means, in some instances, it's best to simply ignore the noise. But, there are some claims that require a response, such as a recent exchange on social media in which Pocketpair was accused of using machine translation tools to localize Palworld for the Vietnamese, Indonesian, Turkish, Polish, and Thai markets.
Buckley says that simply wasn't the case and explains those accusations were based on an incomplete list of credits (miscrediting is, of course, a prevalent issue) that have now been updated. Even so, fighting those battles is often akin to pushing Sisyphus's fabled boulder uphill.
"You know, I can't just come out and start fighting with these people [who make the AI accusations] because that just fuels what's going on," says Buckley. "[Regarding the translation accusation], one of their biggest pieces of 'evidence' was that because we hadn't published the individual names of the translators it must be AI. Well, no, this is just poor Japanese culture in general. A lot of Japanese games, the credits will say localization was handled by a company.
"I'm not saying [that it is] right. It's unfortunate. We don't like it as much as anybody else. But it's how a lot of these companies want to operate. So, we reached out to out to a localization company and we said 'hey look, this thing is happening and it's kind of a headache for us. It would be great if you could just release all the names. They had to contact each person one by one. Eventually they got their approval. And then we released them all. Then, I made a quick comment to say 'hey, thanks for pointing that out, we released [the credits].
"A lot of the people in that thread said 'we appreciate you taking the time' but of course there are still some people in that thread who say 'it's not enough, it's AI.' That's when I feel there's nothing more we can do here. I can say 'it's not, we made it' and they can say 'it is, you didn't make it' and what are we going to do? Just go back and forth forever."
Buckley admits it's situation that, despite being frustratingly common, still stresses him out. He accepts there are legitimate reasons for people to make public accusations when they believe they've unearthed undisclosed AI usage. The technology has yet to win over many creatives within the game industry and beyond, although execs appear increasingly convinced it represents the solution to pretty much every challenge facing their business.
Even so, Buckley feels that for every legitimate accusation, others are unfairly flung out into the social media maelstrom. It's a situation he feels can result in studios like Pocketpair—which, don't forget, is an indie developer—being subjected to a "witch hunt." Meanwhile, despite the vocal protestations of many within the industry, major players like EA, Embracer Group, and Microsoft continue to tout their respective visions of a glorious AI future.
Game Developer is attending Gamescom Asia x Thailand Game Show 2025 as a media partner, with flights and accommodation being covered by event organizers.